Koirala has no right to stay on the Prime Ministerial chair even for a single minute

-Dr. Shoora Beer Paudyal, CEDA, Kirtipur

He is basically a Development Economist. He is in the teaching profession since twenty-three years plus and that too uninterrupted. At the moment he is associated with the Center for Economic Development and Administration or otherwise the CEDA, Tribhuban University.

He obtained his Doctoral degree in the "Tourism Economics" in the year 1999 from the Economics Department of the Banaras Hindu University popularly known as BHU. Prior to this, Dr. Shoora Beer Poudyal secured his Masters of Arts in economics with one-year development economics course from the world famous Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada.

Dr.Poudyal is also the holder of Diploma in Law and Degree of Humanities and Social Science, both from Nepal's Tribhuban University.

Dr. Poudyal has enriched his knowledge through various training on varied topics ranging from Computer programming to participating in the course on Local Economic Development in Israel. The list is long.

At the moment he is Lecturer at the CEDA since 1989.

Prior to this CEDA assignment, Dr. Poudyal has taught at various Nepali educational institutions that again stretch from his teachings at Buda Nilkantha School, and campuses based in Pokhara, Palpa and Bhimphedi.

Dr. Poudyal has submitted research reports on topics such as, for example, "Impact assessment of fiscal measures on environmental sector"; Trends in Intra-regional Tourism in SAARC region; A feasibility study for a Multiple Use Visitor Center in Humla; Feasibility study on Tourism related infrastructure on the Simikot to Hilsa Trail and many more. In all these research works he was the Project Chief. He has acted as Coordinator in some of the research jobs which is not mentioned here.

Dr. Poudyal has several books to his credit. As senior economist of the country, he has books on economics that are used extensively by the Nepalese students.

This scholar has obtained expertise in SAARC Tourism sector business and hopes that even if the current deadlock in the SAARC process continues, some suitable alternatives will be acquired by the private sectors of the SAARC nations for the expansion and the promotion of this business in and among the countries of the region.

He has extensively visited countries of the Developed West. He is member of various professional organizations including the Shalom Club of Kathmandu.

Last week, I met this highly qualified scholar at a social gathering. I approached for an exclusive interview to which he readily agreed. Below the results- Chief editor.

TGQ1: Dr. Poudyal, I suppose you have been closely monitoring the performance of various governments and of various political parties as well over the last decade or so. How you would evaluate their past performances as a responsible citizen of the country? Did the leaders fulfill their promises what they lectured prior to the collapse of the former regime that is the Panchayat? Your exclusive comments please.

Dr.Poudel: The current worse situation of the country is the mirror of the bad performances of the governments. All governments in the past have failed far behind from their promises and people's expectation. However, Manmohan Adhikary led short-lived UML relatively well performed in comparison to others.

TGQ2: We are told that you have gained expertise in the prospects of the tourism business and that too among the SAARC nations. At the moment, the whole SAARC process is in a limbo. This happened in the past as well. So when the whole process is itself counting its last breath, how you expect brighter prospects for a sector that has still a long way to go. However, please enlighten how you see its future bright? What are the conditions to make the tourism business a success in and among SAARC countries? Your comments please.

Dr.Poudyal: Tourism is the biggest emerging business in the world economy. Economic value of the tourism is substantial in a poor region like ours. I think, we can improve our people's living standard through the tourism development linking it with poverty alleviation program. Among the SAARC nations, the Maldives has most successful tourism contributing more than 75 percent of GDP, while in Nepal tourism receipts account for less than 4 percent of GDP. Our region has enormous potentialities of tourism development. However, this region, which consists of 3.3 percent of world territory and 21.5 percent of world population, receives only less one- percent of world tourism receipts. This clearly indicates that our tourism development is lagged behind. Our efforts in days to come should be directed toward developing tourism as an engine of growth. As you know, tourism is largely private based business in the context of SAARC region. However, government's policy initiatives affect the course of development of tourism. One of the main reasons why tourism development in the region did not perform well in the past was governments' bad policy initiative.

I am not so disparate about the future of SAARC and I think current deadlock will come to an end soon. Even if SAARC current deadlock does not last, tourism will take its own course of development since it is our must. In that case, the most likely course of development will be the emergence of joint efforts of private sectors in the respective member states (like FNCCI in Nepal) to promote SAARC tourism. Such efforts will include lobbying government peoples in favor of regional tourism. The growing contact and cooperation among the private sectors will put more pressure on respective governments to improve relation at government level, which will, in turn help the SAARC process move smoothly.

TGQ3: The Lauda air scandal is creating a mess in the nation. Opposition remains adamant and is seeking Prime Minister Koirala's resignation. Koirala remains undeterred. The whole nation is watching this naked drama. Is the opposition demand a constitutional one? Should Koirala resign on moral grounds? The House has been paralyzed. However, the lawmakers ask for their salaries even of those days when the parliament has not functioned. A section of the responsible quarters demand effective role of the King in rescuing the nation from such imbroglio. What would be your remarks in this regard? Enlighten us through your scholarly comments.

Dr.Poudyal: Politics is not my subject. However, as a layman I found most people these days hate politicians. All parties lost their credibility and faith of the people. We are really in crisis. Opposition parties failed to establish their meaningful presence in the parliament. I got an impression that this country suffered much because of Giraja Prasad Koirala. He is the worst Prime Minister we ever had. After the re-inception of multiparty system this gentleman, most of times is in the Prime Minister's chair. In our system Prime Minister is most powerful man in the country. Because of the fact, Girija should take the largest share of responsibility for current bad positioning of the country. If so, he has no right to stay on the Prime Ministerial chair even for a single minute. Girija has institutionalized the corruption in the country. He is always surrounded and supported by most corrupt people in the country. These people control the party, parliament and government. These are the people, who want him see in two chairs at the same time. These are the greatest enemies of the multiparty system in the country. Every body knows they will not let Girija go, it is for the reason we have to push him out of the chair if we want to stop the country going to astray. In this situation, any means that you apply to throw him out of office can be justified. So far as the constitutional process is concerned, it is only a means to keep Girija and his men in office. Whenever, his chair is at stake Girija and his men talk about constitutional process; and in most of the other time, they put themselves above the constitution. What are they doing in case of Maoists? Killing of the innocent people or Maoists in police custody in the name of confrontation is how far constitutional? Is it constitutional to put the people again into jail who are found not guilty in the course of the court trial? How far is the cabinet decision on Lauda case constitutional? There is a long list of the cases of unconstitutional decisions undertaken by Girija government. I think Girija government has repeatedly been violating the constitutional processes in favor of bad people. This should be stopped immediately. Girija now is known as a bad system in the country. Therefore, this system should go with Girija from the government. It will not make any difference if Girija system still rule the country and someone with different name and party sit on the Prime Minister's chair.

If lawmakers are asking for their salaries even of days the house not functioned, it is another fraud case like many cases in the past. This is very sad.

TGQ4: The Maoists have gained in strength of late. The government views it as a terrorist issue while the political parties other than congress consider it as a political one. Tell us what could be the reason behind the sudden emergence of the Maoists insurgency in the country and also tell us how to treat this issue: through holding dialogues or using force?

Dr.Poudyal: There is positive correlation between Maoist movement and bad performances of the governments. In other words, Maoist movement has gained strength because of bad performances of the governments. All governments including UML should take responsibilities of this. Everybody except Nepali Congress says Maoist movement is political problem. They are fighting for political cause and gaining strength because of people's support. The emergence of this movement is due to growing poverty and regional disparity and sheer unwillingness of the governments caring people's needs from the very beginning. Maoists have rightly analyzed the morning of the democracy, which has shown its days to come and decided to go for movement. I think Maoists today have emerged as one of the largest political force in the country and virtually rule most parts of the rural Nepal. In this situation, I do not see the prospect of using force. How many innocent people government is going to kill? Half of the population or even more? This is crazy idea. However, I am not in doubt, Girija will use force and that will lead this country to completely ruin. They will use force because for Girija and his men Maoist movement is the largest business to make money and for this reason they want this business flourish. However, people want to resolve this problem through negotiations. I think their talents should be utilized for economic development of the country and they can be convinced to join the main stream of political arena.

TGQ5: We are told, Nepalese economy is approaching a total collapse. Others say, we are a donor-driven beggar nation. Is there any way out to rescue the economy? Is there any method through the use of which we can make ourselves less dependent on incoming foreign aids? Your exclusive opinions please.

Dr.Poudyal: I think our economy is still in survival stage. However, it is heading to collapse not because of donor driven policies but largely because the current government is most corrupt one. Our immediate neighbor India is planning for 9 percent economic growth rate and China has already achieved two digits growth rates. It is not possible to protect our sovereignty amidst two economic giants unless we will rescue our economy. The only option we have to rescue this economy is government should be clean one. We need new leadership with long vision and strong political will. We should establish the system in which corrupt people can be punished and good people are rewarded. Foreign aid is only for short period to fill the gap between investment needs and domestic savings. We have to utilize the foreign capital in the short period so to build our economy self-sufficient. Only clean hands can do these things. We have multiparty system and do not see the prospect of king's take over. We cannot go back. We had experienced many bad things in Panchayati rule. I agree that today it is worse than that. It is not because Panchayat was superior to this system. It is because Panchayat had performed well compared to this system. We have been suffering more now because this system is not performing well. Multiparty system, no doubt is better system. However, the problem we have now is bad hands are operating good machine and the result is poor. The good hand obviously to operate this good machine cannot be king. There are many good people like Daman Nath Dungana, who can operate this system. Who knows whether we should go another revolution for this in near future?

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